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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24617380">Safe</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/HannibalCatharsis/pseuds/HoshisamaValmor'>HoshisamaValmor (HannibalCatharsis)</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Walking Dead (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Character Study, Comfort No Hurt, Cuddles, Domestic Fluff, Father-Daughter Relationship, Friends With Benefits, Friends to Lovers, M/M, ish ish</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-06-09</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-06-09</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 10:01:31</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,248</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24617380</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/HannibalCatharsis/pseuds/HoshisamaValmor</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Jesus and Gracie have a small conversation about cuddles. And snuggles. And why he's sleeping in Aaron's bed.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Aaron/Jesus (Walking Dead)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>37</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Safe</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Jesus woke up to a little nudge on his shoulder. While before he might have ignored it and doze off back to his comfortable sleep, too many years in this new world had shoved any of those hopeful trivialities away and brand them as fatal sloppiness instead. So now he jolted up, quickly scanning his surroundings by trained instinct, all possible dangers and escapes routes, but that instinct was also ready to tell him at once when there was nothing off. He took a second to recall where he was, and when he did, he realized he was in Aaron's house, in his bedroom. It wasn't a walker that had poked him, but a blonde child standing next to the bed.</p><p>"Gracie," he whispered, flicking on the light on the nightstand and turning his head to Aaron immediately. He was soundly asleep beside him, by some reason completely undisturbed by the sudden harshness of Jesus' movement of jolting up to his elbows. Vaguely aware that not meeting expected threats allowed the fuzziness of sleep to cloud his judgement, Jesus didn't wake him up and instead turned back to Gracie, pulling away the mess of hairlocks he had over his face. "Hey, Gracie. Is something wrong?"</p><p>The little girl had cowered back slightly, looking at him with her eyes wide. She took a moment to nod silently but didn't say anything beyond that.</p><p>"Can I help, or do you want to me to wake up your dad?" he tried. She just waved her head no, which, given the options, didn't exactly leave Jesus with a clear answer. The silence allowed him to slowly become aware of a series of facts, dawning at him one after the other (one, he was talking to Gracie bare chested, and was naked under the covers; two, that made it a<em> bit</em> tricky to either get up to help with whatever she wanted, or to get up in general; three, he was laying on Gracie's father bed seemingly out of nowhere) and making him realize he should really just wake Aaron up.</p><p>Before he turned back to the other man, though, Gracie spoke in a low whisper.</p><p>"Why are you cuddling with my daddy?"</p><p>Jesus blinked and breathed out a smile, pressing his lips afterwards to keep him from just getting an embarrassed smirk splattered on his face. Even if Gracie would be the only witness of it, and a four year old kid was a very lenient audience, he wanted to spare both of them the sight.</p><p>So. Well now. These were treacherous waters to roam on. As much as he was used to talk to the children of the Hilltop and Alexandria, not least of all Gracie herself of course, this was a slightly different situation. He<em> was</em> laying naked on bed next to Gracie's father, and that was a significant change in... well, everything, when talking to a child.</p><p>"Uh... Yeah, that." Eloquency at its finest, but Jesus cut himself some slack over the fact he had been startled awake. That wasn't the best of excuses though, considering all that 'new world acquired skills' and stuff. "Well, we..."</p><p>"Do you like my daddy?"</p><p>"Yeah, of course I do," he replied. "Your dad's a great person."</p><p>"He gives the best cuddles and snuggles," Gracie added, still fully defensive while at the same time she seemed she was studying Jesus' reaction, which in this case was to smile and agree.</p><p>"Yeah, he does."</p><p>"But daddy doesn't cuddle anyone but me," Gracie replied in a hurtful manner, simultaneously pinching his heart a bit and making him want to laugh. "He shouldn't cuddle you."</p><p>Suddenly realizing he had never actually had a conversation like this ever with a child, either in his old life or the new one, and how honestly endearingly scary it was, Jesus could only smile at the surrealness. He had a little girl jealously protective of her father against a partner 'threatening' to take away her love and attention - and the partner in question was <em>him</em>. The first part of this was so... well, normal and mundane to have a kid be jealous, but it seemed like a thing from a different time and that sounded impossible to happen in a world where dead people walked the earth. It was something so genuine and pure that it could clearly transcend even an apocalypse. The second part though, adding<em> him</em> to the mix of that, was just even weirder.</p><p>"Don't worry, Gracie, your dad would never love anyone like he loves you."</p><p>"But you're sleeping there," she pointed accusingly to the bed. "How can I sleep there now?"</p><p>"Sorry. We just fell asleep."</p><p>"But I want to sleep with my daddy," she replied promptly, which was an expected response and Jesus flinched at his lack of notion.</p><p>"Don't worry, Gracie. Let's wake him up."</p><p>He nudged Aaron gently, whose reaction wasn't quite as Jesus', waking up slowly and blinking and scrubbing his eyes to push away sleep. Jesus took a quick moment to make a mental note of how that simple waking up was the sign of how Aaron had started to feel safe. Good.</p><p>"What's wrong?" he asked hazily. As soon as Jesus said the name Gracie, he startled up fully alert, his expression going from sudden worry to relief the moment he saw Gracie was not in any danger and was simply awake. "Hey, sweetie, is something wrong?"</p><p>"I can't sleep," she whispered, still looking warily at Jesus. Aaron turned quickly around to fetch for his clothes and put on his pants before circling around the bed quickly and go to Gracie, picking her up from the floor at once and cuddling her against him.</p><p>"It's alright, sweetie, it's alright. Did you have a bad dream?"</p><p>Gracie nodded her reply by pushing her face against the curve of his neck, holding him tightly and closely as if someone was trying to pull her away from him.</p><p>"It's alright, sweetie. Let's give you a quick shower and we'll put you to bed so you can sleep, alright?"</p><p>"No, you have to stay with me!" Gracie said loudly, hugging him harder and making Aaron nod.</p><p>"Of course I will, Gracie." He then turned to Jesus, fondling his child's hair. "Just give me a moment."</p><p>"I'll go to the couch or-"</p><p>"No, no, please. Stay. You can go back to sleep. Sorry you woke up."</p><p>"There's no problem," Jesus said in earnest. He smiled, but it finally turned into a wide grin when he saw the mistrustful side glance the little girl sent his way over her father's shoulder as he carried her out of the room.</p><p>They were by the door when he caught Gracie's question, low and soft but still hearable.</p><p>"Daddy, is Jesus your boyfriend?"</p><p>While the question did catch him off guard, hearing the slightly surprised and clearly awkward reply from Aaron was kind of sweet in and on itself. Jesus managed to catch the <em>"Uh, no, sweetie, we-"</em> but he didn't hear the rest as he walked the corridor and closed the bathroom door behind him.</p><p>Jesus stood on his elbows for a moment longer before sitting up straight, listening to the muffled sounds of Aaron's and Gracie's voices under the splashing of water. He pulled his hair behind his ears as he thought about his little exchange with Gracie. She was a pretty sharp kid, and that display of jealousy was too adorable to come anywhere close to annoying. Her question to Aaron, however, got him thinking more than he wanted.</p><p>Neither of them had ever been particularly intimate in front of Gracie. Jesus had the almost-exclusive privilege of free passage to Alexandria, maintaining the bonds between the two communities that were detriorating so rapidly, so everytime he came to trade goods and news, he would try to visit Aaron. He had played with Gracie and helped her in her crafts and paper cuttings many times, and often enough they'd all have dinner and he'd spend the night on the couch. Even after he first slept with Aaron, nothing changed in their behaviours in front of her (and honestly, little had changed between the two of them, for that matter). But Gracie <em>was</em> a smart kid; just because she had never seen anyone else sleeping with her father, that didn't mean she hadn't learned from the examples or conversations from the other families in Alexandria that adults who slept together were normally married or boyfriends.</p><p>They weren't boyfriends, though. While he was sure Gracie, and any kid, would accept it better than most adults, Jesus still thought it probably wasn't something they should explain a child. But it wasn't his place to decide what Gracie should know or not, even if it was incredibly simple to get the gist of it. Aaron still loved his husband, and Jesus had no intention of replacing him. They obviously cared for each other, and Jesus felt comfortable with Aaron in a way he didn't feel often. It was about that comfort and company. It was nice to have someone to touch you again sometimes. That was it.</p><p>He did realize, though, that this little overthinking was due to hearing Aaron's reply, or rather, not hearing it in full, and that made him feel tense.</p><p>Jesus knew himself too well. Maggie brought something out in him that he thought impossible, and he loved her for it, but in the end he remained the same: tired, restless, eager, alone in a crowd. His comfort zone was in the uncertainity of discovering places and meeting people, not in staying idle and rooted in the safety of routine that could start happening even in this new world. Of course, he wanted people to feel happy and safe, and he liked to know they were within reach, that they could stay in contact because they were set in a place. But despite his best wishes that maybe Maggie<em> had</em> changed his core, that maybe he could feel comfortable in that safety that everyone longed for, it didn't happen. He could feel himself resent it more everyday that Maggie was away and that the people of the Hilltop turned to him (to <em>him</em>, for God's sake) for leadership. He longed to help people, but he could only do what was within his reach, and what he was willing to.</p><p>In his own way, Aaron represented that. While they were both adults and they could have whatever type of relationship they wanted regardless of labels, Jesus had been subsconsciously aware of this and was now finding himself admiting it: he was worried he might hurt Aaron. While the wound left by his husband was far from ever healing, Aaron cared for people in a way Jesus could only imagine. While they both had the mutual understanding of what they wanted out of adding sex to their friendship, he just hoped they wouldn't get to a point where they just got mutually hurt.</p><p>Aaron was a great guy, and he genuinely deserved to be happy.</p><p>Jesus sighed and held his hands together. It was enough overthinking out of such a simple and silly thing. After yawning several times, he decided there was little point in staying awake. The house had been silent for a while now after Aaron finished Gracie's shower and went to put her to bed. Jesus laid down and was starting to get comfortable pretty much the exact minute Aaron returned to the bedroom.</p><p>"Hey," he said as Jesus got up to his elbows again. "You could've rested."</p><p>"And you could've stayed with Gracie. She did ask you to."</p><p>"Gracie used to sleep with me often," Aaron explained, circling back around the bed to his side and sitting down with a tired yawn. "We've decided that now that's she growing up, she should always sleep in her bedroom. But you know how it is. She still wets her bed sometimes, and other times just has full tantrums to stay awake for as long as she can so I'll stay with her."</p><p>"I see," Jesus said, smiling. "She wasn't too happy to find me here."</p><p>"Oh. Really?" Aaron rubbed at his nape for a moment before he undressed and got under the covers. "I... well, I've kind of explained it to her."</p><p>"Okay," he replied, though the lack of further words left him slightly curious on what Aaron had said.</p><p>Aaron laid down and sighed deeply as he relaxed against the mattress. Jesus turned around to flick out the light, laying down and resting his head on the pillow, feeling suddenly incredibly sleepy. He had no idea what time it was or how long Gracie had taken to fall asleep. Aaron rolled slowly on the bed towards him and lazily placed his arm over Jesus' chest, the warmth and weight of it making Jesus feel comfortable and cozy. He turned on his shoulder and tucked his arms around Aaron's body, nuzzling against his forehead. Aaron returned it with a gentle but tight embrace that made Jesus moan softly and Aaron give a small satisfied sigh.</p><p>"She was angry I was stealing her cuddles," he recalled softly, making Aaron chuckle.</p><p>"Wow. She was jealous."</p><p>"You do give great cuddles though. I'd be jealous too," Jesus whispered, feeling Aaron's smile against the top of his hairline. He gave another leisury squeeze that made them both chuckle.</p><p>It really <em>was</em> a nice feeling, though, to feel safe.</p><p>.</p><p>the end</p><p>.</p><p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Thanks for reading. This kind of fits as a continuation of my fic <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/17565533">Where do we go from here </a>, so I leave the suggestion to peek it if you want to. Disclaimer at the end but obviously don't own The Walking Dead.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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